And baby makes 7!

My oldest brother and his wife are now 5 for 5 on having completely gorgeous children! Seriously. Isn’t she just beautiful?!

Her name is yet to be determined. I am thinking Bethany would appropriate, seeing as how I am the favorite aunt and all. Right, guys?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Photo taken by the actual favorite aunt, Rebecca Anne. I know my place.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

She has been named! She will be known as Audrey Anne.

Special Privileges

Last Monday (President’s Day) -- Brandon and William went together to a nearby train museum. They were there for 2 hours and William still cried when it was time to leave.

Sunday --

William whispered to me: Mommy, can I ask you a question?

Me: Yes

William: When I get an X on my smiley face, what is my surprise?

Me: (Holding back the urge to give him a definition of the word surprise) You get to go back to the train museum.

William: (With the most glorious smile on his face and still attempting to whisper because we are in sacrament meeting.) And see the trains and push the buttons and the train goes round and it has big wheels and I see green and blue and yellow and trains and engines and … and… (only stops because I ask him to be reverent)

Since then – Any mention of the train museum, Xs, or smiley faces results in a run-on sentence similar to the one above.

Moral of the Story – William is a fan of the train museum.

(and based on his recent behavior, he should be taking a trip there soon)

Kitchen Updates

Check out the details at Toodles.

Giddy with excitement.

Edited: Link is working now!

Three Reasons Why Our Pizza Was Fantastic Last Night

 

1. Two words. Pizza stone.

2. (1 green pepper + 1 can tomato sauce + 2 cloves garlic + 1/2 garlic salt + 1/2 palmful basil) x one blender = a sneaky way to get a little extra nutrition into my kids (and their parents!)

3. William ate it without a fuss. This is the norm when we have pizza night, notwithstanding, it is always a victory to have a meal without any begging, pleading, or puking; and therefore, always worth mentioning.

I Will Obey -- Part 2

My greatest frustration as a parent comes when I feel out of control.

Ex. If Marie is crying because she is hurt or tired, no problem, I can handle it. If Marie is crying because she is Marie and likes the sound of her own scream, I am tempted to pull my hair out.

I am learning, line upon oh-so-very-small line, that my reactions can ofttimes be the only thing that I can have control of so I had better figure out how to keep my cool.

It’s a good thing I don’t have to depend solely on myself to figure this out. I can recall the countless times I have gone to an infinite number of sources to help me with whatever current stage my children are in. I am ever grateful for wisdom of others that teach me how I can be in control as a parent and what that control should be.

Because parenting isn’t just about what we teach them, it is about how and why we teach them, right?

Read that last sentence again, would you? That is what was reaffirmed to me this week as we have focused on obedience with William.

I have gained more control of myself and in turn have learned better how to guide him through each day. That is the how.

And the why? My sweet and ever wise husband expounded on that Monday night as he taught our Family Home Evening lesson. After a hands-on Puppet Activity Brandon taught William that we want him to obey us because it will teach him in turn to obey his Heavenly Father and obeying Heavenly Father will allow us to live together forever as a family.

Good heavens, throwing that eternal perspective into it certainly takes it up a notch. Teaching obedience isn’t about my sanity or my need to have a good day or two? It is about eternity?

Suddenly I am realizing that the one who needs these lessons more than anybody else is me.

Line upon line, my friends, line upon line.

I Must Admit …

…that this series of pictures have little rhyme or reason. A group of favorites that I can’t help but look at again and again. … there was no stopping me from taking this picture. How do they learn the ways of the male species so young?

… if I didn’t already love Utah State I would be 100% sold on it after seeing this love muffin decked in Aggie attire.

…I did not do very well preparing for snow in the apparel department. Notice William’s too short snow pants from last year and Marie doesn’t have any!

…when I see this picture I just want to love him and squeeze him and kiss him.

   …if you want to see me tomorrow I will be in our backyard taking my turn on the slide Brandon built for William.

…she is growing up way too fast. Do you think she is talking to a boy on that “phone”?

"Drive My Car" starring William

The lighting is bad. His driving is worse. Good times!

I Will Obey

Remember this post? It doesn’t work. You see, when I lie the problem doesn’t go away. It is just kept a secret. Darn.

That night I did come up with the answer to my puzzlement. What do I do with my son?! What is it that I am not teaching him?

A light bulb came on. Obedience. Teach him obedience.

Nephi and Abraham have become common topics of conversation in our house. William especially likes when Nephi builds the ship.

Tonight was the first of a series of FHE lessons on obedience. I used lesson 14 in Behold, Your Little Ones. Have you used this yet? It is truly inspired. Nine out of ten of our FHE lessons come straight from this book. I love it!

Following that I introduced him to his Obedience Chart. When he obeys Brandon or me the first time we ask he gets an X on his chart. When an X lands on a smiley face he gets a special privilege.

The elements for this chart come from here. I put it in a frame and write the Xs with a dry-erase marker so that I don’t have to print the chart over and over again.

Here goes nothing. Or everything. After all, it is my sanity that is at stake here.

My mom used to tell me that motherhood isn’t for the faint of heart. I wasn’t a mom then. I didn’t get it.

I do now. Good heavens, I do now. And I’m not even close to having a teenager.

*sigh*

A Week to Remember

The subject of today’s post? William’s Diet

Are you still reading? Ah, gee, thanks. We had a serious milestone this week with William. Not since the vegetable soup incident have I been so optimistic that my child won’t be packing baby food in his school lunch. I give you permission to skim through this top bit. It is for me to remember. You may not care. No hard feelings. Read the end. That’s the good part.

Let’s not get into the gag reflex/texture issues. No need to rehash that. Let’s just talk about the accommodations we had to use because of the gag reflex/texture issues.

Menu planning: I had two options for dinners. 1) Make something that could be pushed through the food mill and thus be a consistency that William could handle or 2) Make a meal for Brandon and I and something different for William.

The Dinner Table: If we offered William an unfamiliar food the best case scenario was that we had to coach and cheer him through every bite. The worst case scenario was that through a series of  “resets” in his room we would calm him down enough for us to feed him. Even then getting it in his body and keeping it down were two very different things.

Verbage: One of William’s “disabilities”, if you will, has to do with chewing. He tries to mush the food with his tongue and then swallow it. He doesn’t  like to chew.  Hence the fact that we milled food up for so long. We have stopped milling food, as you know. If I had a dime for every time we have had to say “chew and swallow”, “chew with your teeth”, and “small bites” I could pay for a personal chef.

And I can only skim the surface of the plethora of discussions Brandon and I have had regarding how to help William to eat.  What to say to him? Make him eat or give him something else? Give him a time limit? What is the balance between being positive with him and not giving in? Should we let him go hungry? Before dinner, during dinner, after dinner, while cleaning up puke, in bed, on the phone --- we have talked. We have prayed. I have cried.

Summary: Meal time is rarely an enjoyable time for our family. If you think I am just whining, talk to members of my family who have witnessed us trying to feed William. Not pleasant.

Until this week.

And this is when we get to the good part. The newest milestone in our life. We had a week of meals in which William (and Marie for that matter) sat down and ate his dinner. Most nights he was excited to eat. Even if he wasn’t excited, we didn’t have a single tear shed during the meal. Alright, Marie probably had a couple of fits, but she is teething and she is a bottomless pit when it comes to food so she is excused.

It gets even better than that. The menu was full of meals that Brandon and I love, not just the kids. There wasn’t any compromise on our part. It wasn’t a week of William’s favorite foods. Well, it included a couple of William’s favorite foods, but it was not solely William’s favorite foods. This is a week to be remembered. It may never happen again, so  this is for posterity.

THE MENU

Friday: grilled cheese and turkey sandwiches and soup

Saturday: pasta dinner –  Piccolini pasta saved this meal. William loved eating the tiny wheels.

Sunday: taco soup -- I’ve made this many times before. It was introduced to me by my good friend Kim from college. I love that it is so simple! The recipe from A Year of Crockpotting adds a Ranch seasoning package, I thought I would give it a try. (For the record, I probably won’t use it again, I didn’t notice enough of a difference to make it worth the extra sodium.)  William decided to call this “Taco Time soup.” The reason is beyond me. He has never eaten at Taco Time. He did eat this soup, though. Changes I made: black beans instead of pinto beans; chicken instead of ground turkey; I halved the recipe

Monday: chicken quesadillas – William likes his rolled up. We concede. It is the least we can do.

Tuesday: root vegetable chowder – William sat at the bar and watched me cut the vegetables for this. He kept saying, “yummy” and “I’m going to eat this.” What?! Who are you and what did you do with William? When dinner was ready I called him from his room and he came running down. “I’m gonna eat some soup.” And he did. Garnish it with goldfish crackers. Yummy.

Wednesday: hoisin honey ribs and rice – William has been a lot more interested in eating meat of late, so I knew he would like the ribs. The shocker was the fact that he devoured the rice without us prompting him once. Changes I made: country-style ribs instead of spareribs; cooked it in the crockpot  with the sauce instead of under the broiler

Thursday: green spring chili and french fry pie – This was the moment when I truly declared victory. As I was preparing this I asked Brandon what our position on this was going to be for William. I was sure he wouldn’t eat it. It has lots of funny green things and it is quite spicy. We decided that we would ask him to try it and just go from his reaction. He sat down at the table and said, “I want french fries with chili on them.” Seriously, I think my jaw fell to the floor. He ate it with a bit of help. He learned that if he ate a french fry after a bite of spicy chili his mouth wouldn’t be hot anymore.

Friday: pizza bagels – No commentary needed. It’s pizza. He ate it.

First Haircut

The Golden Rule

After the kids were in bed I sat down at the computer in a reflective and contemplative mood. William pushed Marie this evening resulting in a huge bruise on her forehead. So what else is new, you ask? That is the point. It isn’t new. It is old. Extremely old. Her tell-tale William-just-hurt-me-AGAIN scream is old. Very. Old.

Time-out? Doesn’t stop him.

Toys taken away? He has too many to care.

There I sat at the computer with a prayer in my heart. What on earth can I do with this child?

And here is the answer.

Here is this baby and he refuses to eat his solid food. ("Solid" in this case is a euphemism for "squishy.") Are you a failure as a parent? Is he a failure as a baby? Is the pediatrician a failure as a pediatrician? Would the baby rather have a hot pastrami sandwich? This brings us to the primary rule of baby raising, which is the solution to this and all subsequent problems. This rule must be followed faithfully, and practiced regularly, and you should make it a habit to repeat it to yourself ten times a day. It is the “Golden Rule” of raising babies. LIE. Lie to your mother, lie to your sisters and aunts, and above all, lie to all the other mothers you meet on the street. When a newer mother than you asks for your help. tell her you never had the least trouble. Your baby just loved his mashed bananas on the first try.

Elinor Goulding Smith, The Complete Book of Absolutely Perfect Baby and Child Care (1957)

There you have it. Let me give it a go.

My dear sweet loving William is the best big brother Marie could ask for. He loves to give her hugs and kisses. He is so gentle with her. His favorite thing to do is to share his toys with her. He loves it when she comes in his room and wrecks his train.

Sibling rivalry? Nah. Never heard of it.

Dear Readers,

Have I told you lately that I love you? Seriously. Your comments make me happy. I like to be happy. Smile today knowing that you made me such. Dresses from Grandma make me happy too…